In a one of its kind case, where both the accused and the prosecutrix are blind, a district court in Gurgaon on Tuesday, July 18, 2017 convicted a 33-year-old man for raping a woman on several occasions on the pretext of marriage.

The
33-year-old accused, who worked as a trainee officer at a public
sector bank has been found guilty of raping 32-year-old widow and
mother of an
8-year-old
daughter. The blind
victim
identified her
rapist by
his voice in the court.

In
Focus

Additional session judge Rajni
Yadav found the blind man Saurabh
Kapoor (33), a resident of Delhi's Mayur Vihar guilty
of rape on the basis of call details of the
accused
and the
victim,
medical evidence, forensic report, statement of the
victim
and witnesses.

Meanwhile, public prosecutor Arvind Sharma
said, "It was very difficult to prove the case of prosecution
beyond reasonable doubt especially when both the victim and accused
were completely blind. Statement of victim supported by call details,
medical and forensic evidence help in proving the crime."

He
also added that call details of both the
accused
and the
victim
were obtained in which their locations
were matched at relevant times as described by the
victim
which corroborated.

In her submission to the court, the
woman, a resident of Delhi, said that she had
been
looking for a lawyer after the death of her husband in 2014. Though
her
husband's death
appeared to be a suicide, she suspected foul play and wanted to a
thorough probe and thus, was looking for a lawyer. One of her friends
introduced her to Saurabh (accused), who could find her a good
lawyer. On May 30, 2015, Saurabh took her to Gurgaon on the pretext
of meeting a lawyer.

The
woman told the court, "But instead of taking me to the lawyer, he
took me to a guest house in Gurgaon, where he raped me."

The
woman further alleged, "When I started crying, he asked me to be
quiet and said that he would marry me. Over the next five months, he
sexually exploited me on the pretext of marriage. He also took money
from me on a number of occasions. After some time, he
said that he did not want to continue the relationship."

With
the help of Fatima Kabir, who works with an NGO, the victim lodged
an FIR at Mianwali Nagar West police station in November 2015.
However, the case was later transferred to DCP (west) Gurgaon.
Although, Saurabh was arrested in December 2015, he was later
released on bail.

July
24 has been fixed as the next date of hearing during which the
quantum of the punishment would be announced.

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